The tension which gripped the country after the removal of petrol subsidy has finally eased off. Nigerians are back at their work places and businesses. The street protests and rallies are gone. The anger has abated. Normalcy has come back. The agitations of Nigerians over the deregulation policy proved to be more than a baptism of fire for the President Goodluck Jonathan’s young administration.

Though the president and other government officials admitted that they envisioned a groundswell from the deregulation policy, they, perhaps, took it lightly that some contending interests outside government can ensure that matters slipped out of control. By some calculations in some quarters, the agitations and the citizens’ protests provided a prime opportunity to take down the government, in the fashion of the Arab Spring. Reason is a perceived insensitivity against President Jonathan. While it was clear that some actions and utterances against the president in those testy days were being orchestrated by behind-the-scene interests, it was obvious that he would ride the storm on the strength of his sincerity of purpose.

For eight days, economic and business activities came to a halt in the country, particularly in the South-West, following an indefinite strike called by the labour union. As labour and government negotiated for a solution, they only stared down at each other, looking for who would blink first. Government had to; Jonathan had to break the logjam. A government that has already gone ahead with the implementation of post-subsidy era programmes, such as the aspects of the transportation sub-head in the Subsidy Re-investment and Empowerment (SURE programme), and the appointment of the SURE programme board, reversed itself in the face of agitation from the governed. This hardly speaks of insensitivity! Jonathan does not feel personal pains for backtracking. He backtracked out of a genuine concern for the agitations of the people he leads as their freely and popularly elected president.

“I feel the pain that you all feel,” the president told Nigerians in his broadcast of 7 January, which he devoted more to reassuring Nigerians of the genuineness of his intentions and his steadfastness to the cause of being a responsive leader.

The president yielded ground to the demands of the people, scaling down the pump price of petroleum to N97 in his early morning national broadcast. This cut back would have come much earlier during the negotiations, if the labour union had shifted a foot on its position of N65 or nothing. As long as the negotiations lasted, labour did not balk an inch and only saw reason to shift after the president had announced in the broadcast. Though labour responded by calling off the indefinite national strike of civil servants and agreed to give ear to the Justice Belgore committee set up by government to sanitise the downstream sector of the petroleum industry, labour conceded that the compromise that restored normalcy was the reduction of the pump price of the vexed commodity.

Interestingly, what transpired between the government and the people in the past few days was not a government-versus-the-people fight, as some tendencies dressed it. Though they differed, the intentions of both sides were all noble and directed at achieving the singular goal of securing our economic well-being. For this, Jonathan was appreciative of every input from all quarters, directed at resolving the arguments and reaching a common ground.

The president did not only address the agitation for his government to go back to fuel subsidy; for the second time in one week, he addressed and assured the nation that the quest for reducing the cost of governance would be met. Before this time, Jonathan had announced a 25 per cent reduction in the salary of the executive arm of government.  

And in response to the clamour of Nigerians that the filth in the administration of the subsidy regime in the downstream sector of the oil industry must be tackled, the president hinted that heads will row. The legal and regulatory regime for the petroleum industry, he assured, would be reviewed to address accountability issues and current lapses in the Industry. In this regard, the Petroleum Industry Bill (PIB), he said, would be given accelerated attention, promising that the report of the forensic audit carried out on the NNPC would be studied and its recommendations would be implemented.

“All those found to have contributed one way or the other to the economic adversity of the country will be dealt with in accordance with the law”, the president said firmly in complete contrast to his adversaries’ claim that he was a friend to the corrupt people who brought the country to its prevailing crisis.

•Egbulefu is an Abuja-based politics analyst

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